"Zest" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... madness. It must be—because it's self-destructive," Decoud had said to himself often. It seemed to him that every conviction, as soon as it became effective, turned into that form of dementia the gods send upon those they wish to destroy. But he enjoyed the bitter flavour of that example with the zest of a connoisseur in the art of his choice. Those two men got on well together, as if each had felt respectively that a masterful conviction, as well as utter scepticism, may lead a man very far on ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... his mind he returned to the reading of his letter, enjoying with particular zest the long list of creditors, many of whose names evoked choleric ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... but for the epistles, we should have a very poor opinion of the apostles. Paul in particular is described as setting a fashion which has remained in continual use to this day. Whenever he addresses an audience, he dwells with great zest on his misdeeds before his pseudo conversion, with the effect of throwing into stronger relief his present state of blessedness; and he tells the story of that conversion over and over again, ending with exhortations to the hearers to come and be saved, and threats of the wrath ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... said, "The future is secure—I can wait, and enjoy the waiting." The most of her lost interests revived. She took up music again, and languages, drawing, painting, and the other long-discarded delights of her maidenhood. She was happy once more, and felt again the zest of life. As the years drifted by she watched the development of her boy, and was contented with it. Not altogether, but nearly that. The soft side of his heart was larger than the other side of it. It was his only defect, in her eyes. But she considered ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... one of the originals of the pictures, stepped from the canvas to join our circle. It threw a shimmering luster of an ominously ruddy hue upon the oaken panels. No wonder that the ghost and goblin stories had a new zest. No wonder that the blood of the more timid grew chill and curdled, that their flesh crept, that their hearts beat irregularly, and the girls peeped fearfully over their shoulders, and huddled close together like frightened sheep, and half fancied ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... pardon me here—I can't dwell on this much, The subject is painful—my feelings are such. Oh my! but the straw, it flew high in the air And the chaff chaffed unceasing, but I didn't care, My laughter rang forth with increased vim and zest, My chastisement ...
— A Little Book for A Little Cook • L. P. Hubbard
... side, relieves himself by turning on the other. His shifting his point of view from time to time not merely adds variety and greater compass to his topics (so that the Political Register is an armoury and magazine for all the materials and weapons of political warfare), but it gives a greater zest and liveliness to his manner of treating them. Mr. Cobbett takes nothing for granted as what he has proved before; he does not write a book of reference. We see his ideas in their first concoction, fermenting and overflowing with the ebullitions of a lively conception. ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... our long and winding procession. Indomitable spirit that he was, he traveled three miles to our one, saved us from the furious onslaughts of many a marmot and mountain-squirrel, and, in the absence of fresh meat, ate his salt pork and scraps with the zest of a ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... for the small portion those days. How could he really enjoy his evenings at the Reist house when Lyman Mertzheimer sat there like an evil presence with his smirking smile and his watchful eyes ever open! Some of the zest went out of Martin's actions. His exuberance decreased. It was a relief to him when the boarder's parents returned from their trip and the girl went home. He had her invitation to call at her home in Lancaster. Surely, there Lyman would not sit like the black raven of Poe's poem! ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... confession of faith that that particular gobbler, or hen, as the case may be, was fore-ordained, before the beginning of time, to be chewed by yourself—or eschewed, should you decline it. Somehow theology takes the zest out of the cranberries for me. However, ...
— Moriah's Mourning and Other Half-Hour Sketches • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... don't deny that there is just enough to be said in favour of all these things to make them sell—and this one has two unusual points of interest. It opens with a riddle, and the lady's lover is a priest, which gives an additional zest to the charm of wrong-doing, a sauce piquante ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... also perfunctorily. His coffee was untouched, and the cigarette in his long holder had gone out, but Billy was disposing of eggs, toast, bacon, and cream with youthful zest. Clarence's hot, sick gaze rested almost with hostility upon his wife's cool beauty; in a gray linen gown, with a transparent white ruffle turned back from her white throat, she looked as fresh ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... little less poetic. Thus, step by step, we may review the six centuries of English poetry which lie behind, and when at last we reach the time of Chaucer we shall be able to take hold of his works with understanding and with the zest which is begotten of true sympathy and appreciation. After the book has been thus completed, it may be well to run through it again, reversing the order of the lessons and this time considering the subjects in strict chronological ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... that for years,' he said enthusiastically. Helena smiled gently on him. The charm of his handsome, healthy zest came over her. She liked his naked throat and his shirt-breast, which suggested the breast of the man beneath it. She was extraordinarily happy, with him so bright. The dark-faced pansies, in a little crowd, seemed gaily winking a golden ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence
... prevailed on her to grant me an assignation. But how was it to be effected? Her father kept her always under his eye; she never walked out alone; and the house was locked up the moment that the shop was shut. All these difficulties served but to give zest to the adventure. I proposed that the assignation should be in her own chamber, into which I would climb at night. The plan was irresistible. A cruel father, a secret lover, and a clandestine meeting! All the little girl's studies from ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... that fills the sails and sends the ship gliding over the happy waves. It is the joy of doing things and of seeing that things are well done. It gives to work a thoroughness and a delicious zest and to ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman
... agricultural and rural pursuits, will constitute employment for the few years I have to remain on this terrestrial globe. If, also, I could now and then meet the friends I esteem, it would fill the measure and add zest to my enjoyments; but, if ever this happens, it must be under my own vine and fig-tree, as I do not think it probable that I shall go ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... have seen us, and are bearing away for us, so it matters little now whether the lugger sinks or swims," exclaimed Stukely, as he sprang off the thwart and resumed his task of baling with renewed zest. "Nevertheless," he continued, "it will be well to keep her afloat as long as we may, since she affords a bigger mark to steer for than would the heads of us two afloat upon the ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... He thinks that Mrs. Crutch tells them that I'm locked up somewhere, and that that gives a zest to the search. Some people from Nottingham once did break into old Lady Peterborough's room, and the shew was stopped for a year. There was such a row about it! It prevented Charles coming up for the county. But ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... most said, "Mais, cher enfant, ton pere est Anglais,—c'est tout dire." Meanwhile, as the child sprang rapidly into precocious youth, he was permitted a liberty in his hours of leisure of which he availed himself with all the zest of his earlier habits and adventurous temper. He formed acquaintances among the loose young haunters of cafes and spendthrifts of that capital,—the wits! He became an excellent swordsman and pistol-shot, adroit in all games in which skill helps ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... separation without death produces the same effects in a minor key, to realize the evolutionary value of death. In constant association we grow careless and indifferent. But an absence of a month or two enables one to get a truer perspective of personal associations and thereafter life has new zest. A child regards its mother with a certain degree of appreciation but a short absence enormously increases its appreciation. All human beings come into closer and more sympathetic association after a period of separation, and the completeness of the separation caused by death renders ...
— Elementary Theosophy • L. W. Rogers
... terms of perfect social courtesy in the drawing-rooms of society; and future presidential candidates, cabinet members, senators, congressmen, jurists, orators, and battle heroes lent the little social reunions of Springfield a zest and exaltation never found—perhaps impossible—amid the heavy, oppressive surroundings of conventional ceremony, gorgeous upholstery, and ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... me that one might define Art as: an expression, satisfying and abiding, of the zest of life. This is applicable to every form of Art devised by man, for, in his creative moment, whether he produce a great drama or carve a piece of foliage in wood, the artist is moved and inspired by supreme enjoyment ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... of Harrigan put an end to this dangerous trend of conversation. He walked in tight proper pumps, and sat down. He was only hungry now; the zest for dining was gone. ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... said he; 'we can esteem each other, but we cannot be friends. My banquets lack the secret salt which, according to rumor, gives such zest to your own. And, by Hercules! when I have reached your age, if I, like you, may think it wise to pursue the pleasures of manhood, like you, I shall be doubtless sarcastic on the gallantries ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... girls' talk with great zest; a manager was to be put in his place, and several theories were ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... reputation as a sportsman led him into another catastrophe, and his skating exposed itself as of anything but a graceful and "swan-like" style; where, too, Mr. Pickwick revived the sliding propensities of his boyhood with infinite zest until the ice gave way with a "sharp, smart crack", and Mr. Pickwick's hat, gloves, and handkerchief, floating on the surface, were all of Mr. Pickwick that anyone ...
— Dickens-Land • J. A. Nicklin
... and now, what would he not give for a good day's sport? Such thoughts had frequently crossed the mind of Endymion when drudging in London during the autumn, and when all his few acquaintances were away. It was, therefore, with no ordinary zest that he looked forward to the unexpected enjoyment of an unstinted share of some of the best shooting in the United Kingdom. And the relaxation and the pastime came just at the right moment, when the reaction, from all the excitement attendant on the marvellous change ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... may be read aloud evening after evening, with recurrent zest, with enjoyment of its humor, its quaint and human personages as they take their unhurried way ...
— Humanly Speaking • Samuel McChord Crothers
... spirit with zest, and being a clever saleswoman, she collected a wonderful assortment of dainty novelties and confections, while the manager of the store rubbed his hands together gleefully as he observed the correspondingly wonderful ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... came in from his ride, he found the old gentleman upon the hearth-rug, his white hair tossing over his brow, as he recited from Mr. Addison with the zest of a schoolboy ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... was not sick at all. He carried a good appetite to every meal and entered into the pleasures of sea life with zest. He played shuffle-board on deck, guessed daily the ship's run, was on the alert for distant sails, and managed in one way or another to while away the ...
— Joe's Luck - Always Wide Awake • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... this lament to say a word for myself and my ancestors. It is easy to blame us as undiscriminating, but we are at least full of zest. And it's well to be interested, eagerly and intensely, in so many things, because there is often no knowing which may turn out important. We don't go around being interested on purpose, hoping to profit by it, but a profit may come. And anyway it is generous of us not to ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day Jr.
... The nosegays were torn from one another's hands and bosoms; the glasses and china went to wreck; the tables and floors were strewed with comfits. Some cried; some swore; and the tropes and figures of Billingsgate were used without reserve in all their native zest and flavour; nor were those flowers of rhetoric unattended with significant gesticulation. Some snapped their fingers; some forked them out; some clapped their hands, and some their back-sides; at length, ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... his lips resoundingly; swigged coffee from his saucer through an overlapping moustache and afterwards hissingly strained the aforesaid obstruction with his nether lip; talked and laughed with his mouth full,—but all with such magnificent zest that his guests overlooked the shocking exhibition. Indeed, the girl seemed quite accustomed to Mr. Striker's table-habits, a circumstance which created in Kenneth's questing mind the conviction that she was ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... the penalty for almost all serious violations of the law gave an additional zest to crime. The criminal looked upon himself, and was looked upon by others, as a brave man, and even those who abhorred the crime retained a certain admiration for the courage which they thought involved in ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... what student or philosopher would? albeit the utmost gratification ever earned by either of these in the prosecution of his special calling—in acquiring knowledge, in solving knotty problems, or in scaling the heights of abstract contemplation—is probably as inferior in keenness of zest to that which the poet knows, as the best prose is inferior in charm to the best poetry. It may even be that both poet and philosopher owe, on the whole, more unhappiness than happiness—the one to his superior sensibility, the other to his superior ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... exploits the nests of the Mason-bee of the Pebbles and the Mason-bee of the Sheds with equal zest. To observe the insertion of the egg at my ease and to watch the operator at work over and over again, I gave the preference to the last-named Mason, whose nests, removed from the neighbouring roofs ...
— The Mason-bees • J. Henri Fabre
... pet maniac. They were often closeted together in high discourse, and indeed discussed Psychology, Metaphysics, and Moral Philosophy with indefatigable zest, long after common sense would have packed them both off to bed, the donkeys. In fact, they got so thick that Alfred thought it only fair to say one day, "Mind, doctor, all these pleasant fruitful hours we spend together so sweetly will not prevent my indicting you for a conspiracy ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... mile or two the zest of the chase was dulled by the Wildcat's habitual languor. He edged over towards the Mud Turtle. "Mud Turtle, 'spec' dese gen'men gwine to give us fo' bits, mebbe, fo' he'pin 'em hunt dese golfs what we ain't seed. Ah feels ...
— Lady Luck • Hugh Wiley
... glasses, which did not seem to fit his nose, fretted with things in his waistcoat pockets or put his hands behind him, looked over our heads, and ever and again rose to his toes and dropped back on his heels. He had a way of drawing air in at times through his teeth that gave a whispering zest to his speech It's a sound I can only ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... entrancing, ever inviting. Her whole personality, in fact, seemed to pervade his mind, warring for sole possession, to the exclusion of all other thought, all other consideration. Into the conflict his own mind entered with a zest. It was a psychological struggle which appealed to him, and that thoroughly. She should not, by her witchery, take entire possession. Yet the recollection of her was so potent that at length he ceased to strive against it. He gave way,—abandoned himself ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... have met with this morning only give us variety. We need something of this kind to add zest to life. Just imagine what life would be if everything turned out just as you wanted it or willed it? You would commit suicide within ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Mysteries of the Caverns • Roger Thompson Finlay
... the reply, 'but he's very busy. Look here; not an opinion given yet, on any one of these cases; and an expedition fee paid with all of them.' The clerk smiled as he said this, and inhaled the pinch of snuff with a zest which seemed to be compounded of a fondness for snuff and a relish ...
— Bardell v. Pickwick • Percy Fitzgerald
... coming from more northerly and provincial neighbourhoods where art lives a little desolately and barely, in want of the graces and adornings with which 'culture' professes to provide her. There were politicians still capable—as it was only the first week of May—of throwing some zest into their amusements. There were art-critics who, accustomed as they were by profession to take their art in large and rapid draughts, had yet been unable to content themselves with the one meagre day allowed by the Academy ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a book that is really FUNNY. Not the machine-made, madly-advertised type. 'The Need of Change' is the kind that usually you pick up by accident, start to run through casually, find yourself startled into a chuckle by some unexpected humorous line, and end by reading every word with zest and hustling around to loan it to your friends.... Keeps the reader in one continuous howl; the fun never becomes forced. ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... the delights of skating, which were afforded by the exceptionally severe frost of February 1855, which came opportunely to regale with this favourite pastime one who would never tread on solid ice again. He wrote with zest of the large merry party of cousins skating together, of the dismay of the old housekeeper when he skimmed her in a chair over the ice, sighing out, in her terror, 'My dear man, don't ye go so fast,' with all manner of endearing expressions—of the little ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... wheels within wheels, in this strange, pathetic life of the musician, whose collecting hobby and expert's skill in finding out rarities Balzac dwells on with all the greater detail as he was indulging at that time his own bent in this direction with peculiar zest and success. But the complexity and crowding are foils one is glad to have against the sordid treachery of the Cibot household, as, too, against the woes of Pons and Schmucke. Perhaps nowhere in his achievement has ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton
... tired, without knowing quite what was the matter with him. A man, even a young and sturdy man, cannot work like a horse for months on end, eating his meals anyhow and sleeping when he can, without losing temporarily the zest for careless fun. For another thing, he found himself looking at these immaculate young people as any hard-driven worker ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... One sitting-room, and a couple of dormitories containing a camp-bed for each member, with pegs and racks for arms and implements, formed the whole of the appointments and furniture; but the sport is first-rate; and the plain simplicity of this menage gives increased zest to the meeting, and promotes the hardihood essential both to the successful pursuit of game and to the healthful enjoyment of ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... exceed the mirth and hilarity of the company. No restraint, but of good manners—no excess of conventionalities—genuine, hearty good-humor and enjoyment, such as pleasant, hospitable people, with just enough of the French element to add zest to anything like amusement, could furnish, to make the entertainment agreeable. In a country so new, and where, in a social gathering, the number of the company was more important than the quality, the circle was not ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... blocking his narrow trail; but, keyed up as he was, he managed to get by them without so much as rustling a twig. "I'm fending for two now," he said to himself, and the very thought was sweet, lending zest to the matching of his capacities against ...
— Labrador Days - Tales of the Sea Toilers • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... young and more full of life and activity than most girls of her age. She enjoyed what came in her way to enjoy with a passionate zest, and she had the reputation of being somewhat capricious and changeable. But she was honest in all her thoughts, and very clear- sighted. People often said she spoke her mind too freely, and was not enough in awe ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford
... great thing is the game, the contest; and the contest is no contest unless the contestants are so nearly equal as to forbid any certainty in advance as to which will win. The best sport is found when no one contestant wins too often. There is in reality a common purpose—the zest of contest. Players combine and compete to carry out this purpose; and the rules are designed so to restrict the competition as to rule out certain kinds of action and preserve friendly relations. The contending rivals are in reality uniting to stimulate each other. Without the ...
— The Ethics of Coperation • James Hayden Tufts
... train him his master used to put him on the trail of one of the Cottontails. It was nearly always Rag that they ran, for the young buck enjoyed the runs as much as they did, the spice of danger in them being just enough for zest. He would say: ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... distressingly tender state that so bothers your mortal man. They go about their business with an enviable singleness of purpose, and when they have eaten and drunk, and attained to the fulness of life, they divide and begin again with renewed zest the ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... difficult to foresee that the Romance so dear to the last generation will soon become the exclusive heritage of the vulgar. Meanwhile, genial sketches of fresh, unaffected Nature, draughts from real life, are beginning to be loved with keen zest. What novels are so successful as those in which the writer has truthfully mirrored the heart or the home? What pictures are so loved as those which set before us the Real, or, rather, the Ideal in its true meaning—that of the perfected essence ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... in the first enjoyment of a feeling, of which habit must have afterwards dulled the zest, namely, the proud consciousness of having surmounted the disadvantages of birth and station, and placed himself on a level with the highest and noblest of the land. This footing in the society of the great he could only have attained by parliamentary eminence;—as a mere writer, ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... less than usual zest. It was rectangular and very heavy. For a moment he hesitated to open it. There was something about its inscription ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... tired of this dreadful struggle after holiness; good books are all alike, flat and meaningless. But I must have something to absorb and carry me away, and I have come back to my music and my drawing with new zest. Mother was right in warning me against giving them up. Maria Kelley is teaching me to paint in oil-colors, and says I have a natural ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... I saw her a few times, at long intervals, on the steps of her house, or entering her little car, and half-consciously I noted her charm and her evident zest of life. ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... eternal warfare of youthful idealism with "respectability" and convention. Ibsen had already started work upon the greatest of his Norse Histories—The Pretenders. But history was for him little more than material for the illustration of modern problems; and he turned with zest from the task of breathing his own spirit into the stubborn mould of the thirteenth century, to hold up the satiric mirror to the suburban drawing-rooms of Christiania, and to the varied phenomena current there,—and in suburban drawing-rooms elsewhere,—under ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... therefore, owed their earliest revival to the vagaries of a capricious taste, and the desire to give zest to the architecture of the day by their novelty. It was not for the sake of the new life there was in them, and of that pliable spirit of refinement so suited to the wise re-birth of ancient Love in Art. It is not surprising ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... attracted her so little. He liked to have her with him, and it soon became a matter of course that she should accompany him on all his expeditions. She revelled in his tours of inspection. They were so many picnics to her, and she enjoyed them with the zest of a child. ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... nature. I appealed and appealed. She watched me with the same air of interested detachment that one gives to a squirrel revolving in a cage. I could feel that she was flattered; her sense of power was agreeably tickled; my earnestness and despair enhanced the zest of her reiterated refusals. I was a very nice young man, but her son was going to marry Bertha McNutt ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... feature of his recent life had given place to the swift intuitions of his youth. He saw his way as he used to when a boy, and made his decisions rapidly and executed them fearlessly. The discovery of this fact gave a new zest and hope to life. ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... same duties or enjoyments will not be quite the same, and even if the outward things remained absolutely unaltered, we who meet them are not the same. Little variations in mood and tone, diminished zest here, weakened power there, other thoughts breaking in, and over and above all the slow, silent change wrought on us by growing years, make the perfect reproduction of any past impossible. So, however familiar may be the road which we have to traverse, however uneventfully the same ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... among the dancers, and she appeared to enter into the spirit of the occasion with almost the zest of a young girl during her first season; while it was noticed that Mr. Palmer was her companion more frequently than ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... presented him with a well-swept hearth and a pleasant fire, before which had been placed the identical chair that they had appropriated to his own use. Frank was enjoying "a blast o' the pipe," after having risen; to which luxury the return of Owen gave additional zest and placidity. In fact, Owen's presence communicated a holiday spirit to the family; a spirit, too, which declined not for a moment during the period ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... him. He apes like a monkey the jolly Jack Tar, and spends his wages accordingly. If chance brings him back again to Zanzibar, he calls his old Arab master his father, and goes into slavery with as much zest as ever. ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... I began, by reminding you of the great tasks and duties of peace which challenge our best powers and invite us to build what will last, the tasks to which we can address ourselves now and at all times with free-hearted zest and with all the finest gifts of constructive wisdom we possess. To develop our life and our resources; to supply our own people, and the people of the world as their need arises, from the abundant plenty of our fields and our ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... took in every white man with whom he had dealings, till the new colony abolished that exclusive agency, that monopoly so sacred in negro eyes, which here corresponded with the Abbanat of the Somal. Mr. Wilson (p. 252) recounts with zest a notable trick played by this "little, old, grey-headed, humpback man" upon Captain Bouet-Willaumez, and Mr. W. Winwood Reade (chap, xi.) has ably dramatized "Krinji, King George and the Commandant." On another ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... past three months she had constantly been at war with her own self for this: she hated and despised herself for that numbness of the heart which had so unaccountably taken all the zest and the joy out of her life. Does one love one day and become indifferent the next? What had become of the girlish love that had invested Maurice de St. Genis with the attributes of a hero? What had he done that the pedestal on which her ideality had hoisted him ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... and make a fool of, a man who was strong and cunning in his own sphere; to have a hand—gloved in officious friendship—in other lives, furnished the zest of her unemployed life. She could introduce discord into a family without even acknowledging to herself that she had done it wittingly. She could do it, and weep over the injustice that charged her with it. Her ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... some time Parker discovered that the dog had been let loose and had found the beef some moments before. He explained that it was a singular dog and preferred to live by dishonesty. Unstolen victuals had for him no zest. He added that the loss was of no consequence, as he never had been very keen on that piece of beef. We finally retired into the tent, and left Parker still at work completing several contracts he had undertaken to carry through "by'n-by." He said he preferred doing them overnight, as it ...
— Tomaso's Fortune and Other Stories • Henry Seton Merriman
... middle point in his career, had found that he had, without knowing it, encountered a Fact which had gripped him in a vital part, squeezed the very fibres of him, sucked him apparently dry of human juices, even of the zest to live, and presently departed, leaving him faint by the wayside. Not until he was clean gone did he have the least suspicion that it had been there, and (if he could have known it) the first glimmering of reawakening pulse in him was the ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... lying here," said Isbister, with the zest of a life freely spent, "I have changed my plans in life; married, raised a family, my eldest lad—I hadn't begun to think of sons then—is an American citizen, and looking forward to leaving Harvard. There's a touch of grey in my hair. And this man, not a day older nor ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... varnish of civilisation, and a German Sappho who poured forth a stream of pretentious and at the same time ludicrous complaints. The play unwittingly performed by these unpaid actors was enjoyed by our friend with all the zest the feeling of superiority can give. What a tragi-comical arrangement it is that in this world of ours everybody is laughing at everybody else! The scientists of the congress afforded Chopin an almost ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... magnanimous youth of Madame Roland and others was discouraged by pages sown with mean anecdote. Helvetius tells us, with genuine zest, of Parmenio saying to Philotas at the court of Alexander the Great—"My son, make thyself small before Alexander; contrive for him now and again the pleasure of setting thee right; and remember that it is only to thy ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... he said with a vast zest, and at once his head was back again at that calm blue window. In that flash of the head Rodriguez had seen his eyes, blue, round and bulging; the round man was like a boy who in some shop window has seen, unexpected, huge forbidden sweets. Clearly, in the war he watched things were going well for ...
— Don Rodriguez - Chronicles of Shadow Valley • Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Baron, Dunsany
... too as she hastened within to prepare for the expedition. She did not feel any very keen zest for it, but, as she told Columbus, they need never go again if ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... that I could hardly catch a glimpse of her before she was gone. The whole incident was entirely simple, but it left a deep impression on my mind; and as I turned back once more to look at the cattle in the field, the zest of life in the cow, who was munching the lush grass with deep breaths, while she whisked off the flies, appeared to me fraught with mystery. My readers may laugh at my foolishness, but my heart was full of adoration. I offered my worship to the pure joy of living, which is God's own life. ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore
... that land; of his meeting with the haunted hermit in the woods; of the convict audience at Tasmania, for whom he acted in The Ticket-of-Leave Man; and of the entertainment furnished in a Chinese theatre, are compositions that would impart to any book the interest of adventure and the zest of novelty. Such pictures as those have a broad background; they are not circumscribed within the proscenium frame. The man is seen in those passages as well as the actor; and he plays his part well, amid picturesque surroundings of evil and peril, of tragedy and of pathos. In Australia ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... qualities that are the basis of longevity—a nature simple and serene, a physique perfect in all involuntary functions and with the impulse of sane and regular usages to guide voluntary ones, an appetite and zest for work. She had married at eighteen and had lived to see her son reach his eightieth year, herself missing the century mark ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... away to make the drive there and back a feature; as much dancing in an informal way as could be managed by the younger people; and a certain amount of flirtation, of course (but of a very harmless sort), to supply zest to all the rest. But it is not intended to give a minute account of the life, nor to describe in detail all the pursuits and festivities which prevailed during the season. Enough to say that our friend soon had opportunity to partake in them as much and ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... inwoven figures and histories of great men and women, quite as large as life, and all of very florid complexion and luxurious costumes. He has already exhumed a great many square yards of this picturesque fabric, wrought in by-gone ages, and is continuing the work with all the zest and success of a fortunate archaeologist. Now it is altogether probable, that Cowper, as he sat in one of those rooms writing at his beautiful rhymes, had not the slightest idea that he was surrounded by such a crowd of kings, queens, and other great personages, barely concealed ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt
... in a very different manner. The family, whose guests we were, possessed a gay and graceful hospitality that gave zest to each moment. They possessed that rare politeness which, while fertile in pleasant expedients to vary the enjoyment of a friend, leaves him perfectly free the moment he wishes to be so. With such hosts, pleasure may be combined with repose. They lived ...
— Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 • S.M. Fuller
... buried palaces. Men came back from their journeys with some lovely terra cotta, some ivory or bronze, some painting by an old master, whose beauty had been hidden for centuries under smoke and grime. The enthusiasm of the collectors exceeds the zest of men searching for gold and diamonds amid the sands ...
— The Blot on the Kaiser's 'Scutcheon • Newell Dwight Hillis
... basket in the middle of the path, in the vain hope of tripping up the tipsy riders, she fled wildly along in the direction of home. Her hood falling back, disclosed her pretty floating curls beneath, and so gave greater zest to the pursuit. Fleet of foot she might be, but what availed that against the speed of the two fine horses? She heard their galloping hoofs closer and closer behind her. She knew that they were almost up with her now. Even the osier beds would afford ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... to take on the color of her lover's habits of thought and feeling; she expressed herself even more warmly than she felt, so that Albert was happy, and this story was doomed to suffer because of his happiness. I might give zest to this dull love-affair by telling you that Mr. Minorkey opposed the match. Next to a disdainful lady-love, the best thing for a writer and a reader is a furious father. But I must be truthful at all hazards, and I am obliged to say that while Mr. Minorkey would have been ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... though we had both descended to the humble bicycle, a lot of reading was forced upon us in the winter evenings. Thus the war came as a boon to us both. It not only provided us with an honest interest in life, but gave point and zest to innumerable spins across Richmond Park, to the nearest paper shop; and it was from such an expedition that I returned with inflammatory matter unconnected with the war. The magazine was one of those that are read (and sold) by the million; the article ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... portrait-busts was secondary, owing to his inventive ardor; the study he bestowed upon the lineaments of Washington, however, gave a zest and a special insight to his endeavor to represent his head in marble, and, accordingly, this specimen of his ability, which arrived in this country after his decease, is remarkable for its expressive, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... his apartments, unless at dinner or a theater supper. If a wealthy bachelor has a large house, and instead of one there are a number of matrons chaperoning, the case is different. Manhattan or Martini cocktails could be passed around before luncheon, or some little peculiar dish be served to give a zest to the occasion. ...
— The Complete Bachelor - Manners for Men • Walter Germain
... man, and the heavenward pointing spires of the Christian Church. The feeling that we might be the means of bringing about this happy state of things by discovering a country habitable by Europeans, greatly added to the zest with which we prosecuted ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... to him; here he drank delight of battle with his peers. In after days, when he drove by this stately pile, or when on rare occasions his duty called him here, he greeted his old haunts with the affectionate zest of a child of the house; during all the last ten years of his life, filled as they were with activity and glory, he never ceased to be homesick for this hall. When he came to the presidency, there was not a day when his congressional service was not of use to him. Probably no other president has ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... depicted. Cynical and soured you may account me. Such I know I was accounted in Paris; a man satiated with all that wealth and youth and the King's favour could give him; stripped of illusions, of faith and of zest, the very magnificence—so envied—of my existence affording me more disgust than satisfaction. Since already I had gauged ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... Gilbert Elliot (as a "law lord," or judge, Lord Minto), and so he could say: "I have shaken a spear in the debatable land, and shouted the slogan of the Elliots": perhaps "And wha dares meddle wi' me!" In "Weir of Hermiston" he returns to "the auld bauld Elliots" with zest. He was not, perhaps, aware that, through some remote ancestress on the spindle side, he "came of Harden's line," so that he and I had a common forebear with Sir Walter Scott, and were hundredth cousins of each other, if we reckon in the primitive ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... report the galleries were crowded with ladies, and every member present, Democrat as well as Republican, was supplied with a petition. As it had been rumored about that Mr. Greeley's report would be against suffrage for women, the Democrats entered with great zest into the presentation. George William Curtis, at the special request[102] of the ladies, reserved his for the last, and when he arose and said: "Mr. President, I hold in my hand a petition from Mrs. Horace Greeley and three hundred other ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... conscientious persons lose all the zest of living. The existing world seems to them brutal, its order, tyranny; its morality, organized selfishness; its accepted religion, a shallow conventionality. In such a world as this, the good man stands like a gladiator who has suddenly become ...
— By the Christmas Fire • Samuel McChord Crothers
... October. He entered with avidity upon the duties of his office, and also made himself conspicuous in society, where he was from the first regarded in the light of a decided acquisition. He entered with keen zest into plans for party-giving and entertaining, and evidently derived heartfelt pleasure from receiving and dispensing courteous hospitalities. He attended several public meetings which had been called for charitable and other purposes, at all of which he spoke with what was considered a somewhat ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... become acquainted with my features and general appearance. Shouldn't wonder if he follows me up and tries to discover where I live—yes, there the beggar is, obviously following me! Very well, I have no objection; on the contrary, the task of dodging him will add a new zest to life. And I'll give him a good run ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... the disregard of conventionality in one phase, and the falling under it in another—the reaction and the retreat from what had attracted and interested him, and then the return upon it, as with added zest because of the retreat. The confessed Hedonist, enjoying life and boasting of it just a little, and yet the Puritan in him, as it were, all the time eyeing himself as from some loophole of retreat, and then commenting ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... Johnny, for where they went there was zest of life; and the boys, knowing well that Johnny never wore flowers, made instant way for him ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester
... business; but he was a changed man. All zest in the thing was gone. His fraud set him above the world; and that was now enough for him, in whom ambition was dead, and, indeed, nothing left alive in him but ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... and sports. To almost every man there is joy in the memory of these things; they are the happiest associations of his boyhood. It does not occur to him, that he also might be as happy as a boy, if he lived more like one. What do most men know of the "wild joys of living," the daily zest and luxury of out-door existence, in which every healthy boy beside them revels?—skating, while the orange sky of sunset dies away over the delicate tracery of gray branches, and the throbbing feet pause in their tingling ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... Fra Lippo Lippi, in spite of the man's impudence and debauchery; because the painter loved life, had a tremendous zest for it, and was not ashamed of his enthusiasm. The words he speaks came from the ...
— Robert Browning: How To Know Him • William Lyon Phelps
... sea-vagabond, was not created in vain. He enjoyed life with the zest of everlasting adolescence; and, though cribbed in an oaken prison, with the turnkey sentries all round him, yet he paced the gun-deck as if it were broad as a prairie, and diversified in landscape as the hills ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... even if he were able to do it. These Turks took a pleasure in torturing children, too; cutting the unborn child from the mother's womb, and tossing babies up in the air and catching them on the points of their bayonets before their mothers' eyes. Doing it before the mothers' eyes was what gave zest to the amusement. Here is another scene that I thought very interesting. Imagine a trembling mother with her baby in her arms, a circle of invading Turks around her. They've planned a diversion: they pet the baby, laugh to make it laugh. They succeed, the baby laughs. At that moment a Turk ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... Lysbet. Trouble and hardship make us love life. A zest they give to it. It is when we have too much money, too much good food and wine, too much pleasure of all kinds, that we grow melancholy and sad, and say all is vanity and vexation. You may see that it is always so, if you look in the Holy Scriptures. It was not from ...
— The Maid of Maiden Lane • Amelia E. Barr
... retinue, and among whom this vulgarity was taken for sprightliness, and cheap cynicism for wit, I noticed two or three new faces: a very obsequious Pole who was on a visit in the town; a German doctor, a sturdy old fellow who kept loudly laughing with great zest at his own wit; and lastly, a very young princeling from Petersburg like an automaton figure, with the deportment of a state dignitary and a fearfully high collar. But it was evident that Yulia Mihailovna had a very high opinion of this visitor, and was even a little anxious of the impression ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... a crowd." Both of them glanced over at pretty Mrs. Odwell. She was looking down at her plate demurely while Reggie Van Voort talked straight into her pink ear, his eyes gleaming with the zest of invasion. "I say, Miss Drake, you won't mind talking to me a while after dinner, will you?" went on Odwell, something like relief in ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... refused to interfere with her plans. He went about his work from that day on, however, with a feverish eagerness and zest, and an exaltation that frequently lifted him to a sort of glory that he could neither define nor deny. There were moments when he slipped far back into the depths, and cursed himself for rejoicing in the sacrifice ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... should die as that Henry of Bearn should fall in love. Love had been the main relaxation of his otherwise strenuous life, and neither the advancing years—he was fifty-six at this date—nor the recriminations of Maria de' Medici, his long-suffering Florentine wife, sufficed to curb his zest. ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... magnified puerility among them it is customary to assume. I was indeed a voracious reader of everything but boys' books—which I detested—and fiction. I read histories, travel, popular science and controversy with particular zest, and I loved maps. School work and school games were quite subordinate affairs for me. I worked well and made a passable figure at games, and I do not think I was abnormally insensitive to the fine quality of our school, to the charm of its mediaeval nucleus, ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... his watch, and took a drink of water. One or two men shifted their attitude from one side to the other, and all waited as children do for an absorbing story. A momentary look of satisfaction came over the face of the evangelist, and he began again with zest. ...
— Women of the Country • Gertrude Bone
... Vatican; in banquets, dancing, the performance of comedies, masques, etc., was the time made to pass as agreeably as might be for the guests from Ferrara, and in all Cesare was conspicuous, either for the grace and zest with which he nightly danced, or for the skill and daring which he displayed in the daily joustings and entertainments, and more particularly in the bull-fight that was included ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... and as his little pointings were swept away, he forgot, too, the sacred ejaculations he was wont to lard his discourse with, and he became positively profane. The captain won largely in the beginning, and jeered his compadre with great zest and enjoyment; but that one-eyed, rapacious old Spanish rascal was not in the least disturbed, and bided his time. At first the conversation was light and jovial, Captain Brand insisting upon the doctor describing minutely how he had hacked his friend ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... black and white keys—his hands were often stiff with cold—under the threatening ruler, which descended at every false note, and the harangues of his master, which were more odious to him than the blows. He thought that he hated music. And yet he applied himself to it with a zest which fear of Melchior did not altogether explain. Certain words of his grandfather had made an impression on him. The old man, seeing his grandson weeping, had told him, with that gravity which he always maintained for the boy, that it was worth while suffering a little ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... the marble game is in full blast, and gradually it drives out, till another spring, its beloved rival. Tops are of great antiquity, and the Chinese and their neighbors, the Japanese, are famous for the variety of their tops. I have seen adults in those countries enjoying the game with all the zest ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort
... a week's hunting with greater zest than the Britons. To them life seemed to begin anew, and although the skies were bluer and the mountains higher and rougher than those of Britain, it seemed to them that they were once again enjoying their native ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... was the same, and my brothers," the Sparrow philosophized. "Spring-cleaning and moving took every ounce of sense out of them." Mary sighed. Her zest for the preparations ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... matter to carry them out. Miss Gibbs usually locked the wire door behind her, only leaving it open when she went upstairs to fetch something and meant to return almost immediately. The mere fact of its difficulty increased Raymonde's zest for the adventure. Her wild, harum-scarum spirits welcomed the element of possible danger, and the imminence of discovery added an extra spice. For days she haunted the vicinity of the winding staircase, hiding in bedrooms and watching, in case Miss ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... stood by the door. My first feeling of fear had passed away, and I thrilled now with a keener zest than I had ever enjoyed when we were the defenders of the law instead of its defiers. The high object of our mission, the consciousness that it was unselfish and chivalrous, the villainous character of our opponent, all added to the sporting interest of the adventure. Far from feeling ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... spring all over the land, and Gilbert resumed his farm-work with the fresh zest which the sense of complete ownership gave. He found a purchaser for his wagon, sold one span of horses, and thus had money in hand for all the coming expenses of the year. His days of hauling, of anxiety, of ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... cousin added zest to the situation. Though ten years her senior, Jack Forest had long been the best chum she had—he was best chum to a good ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... each other and believe we can help each other, and I am sure one of the reasons why we love each other is that we both have enthusiasm and find life intensely absorbing and admire that in the other. There's the great difference between me now and what I was at eighteen. The mere zest of existence seems to me so much greater than it used. There are so many interesting things to do, so many interesting things which we would like to do. And now we shall be able to do them together, shan't we?" she concluded, her eyes ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... thoroughfare of Piccadilly, noiseless, shadowy, deserted. He had thrown up the window overcome by a sudden sense of suffocation, and a chill, damp breeze came stealing in, cooling his parched forehead and hot, dry eyes. For the last two or three hours he had been working with an unwonted and rare zest; it had happened quite by chance, for as a rule he was a man of regular, even mechanical habits. But to-night he scarcely knew himself,—he had all the sensations of a man who had passed through a new and ...
— Berenice • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the extreme, for the girl was full of young life and sauciness and merry humour. I can safely aver that I have never been to an evening's so-called entertainment which, to me, was half so enjoyable. It added also to the zest and keen edge of the enjoyment to see her hasten to hide herself whenever I told her we were going to stop to take ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens |
